Page 93 of Freak Camp
Probably just an ear, then.That was likely.Even assuming that Jake cut into the ear canal and damaged something internal instead of just taking off the outer skin, Tobias would still be able to hear orders fine with the one left.Even better, this might mean Jake wanted him for more than just a couple of weeks’ hard ride, wanted to mark Tobias as his.Andthatwas more than okay.If he was Jake’s, Jake was much more likely to salt and burn him somewhere when he got tired of him than to let an old possession get passed around back in FREACS.
Tobias could deal with losing any body parts right now if it was something Jake was doing to claim him as his own.And even if he was too hopeful, if Jake had no problem dumping him back at Freak Camp after he’d had his use of him, at least it would be a reminder that he had once been Jake’s.
Tobias’s thought process had lasted just a couple of seconds.By the time Jake stepped up to him, Tobias’s heart rate was back down, and he watched Jake and the wire cutters almost hopefully, trying not to let his daydreams fly away with him.
“Tilt your head up,” Jake said.“I want to get a good angle so I don’t hurt you.”
The last sentence didn’t make any fucking sense, and it almost shattered the edge of Tobias’s happy calm, but he obediently closed his eyes and tilted his head up, hoping Jake hadn’t noticed how the blood beat harder in his jugular.
The slide of the wire cutters’ cold metal against his throat and the sharpsnapnext to his ear made him clench his jaw.The lack of pain nearly made him panic becauseoh God, what happened that I can’t even feel it?
Then something hit the ground.Something that sounded too heavy to be an ear.
Tobias opened his eyes, and Jake was smiling at him, the smile that always made Tobias’s heart race in a way that had nothing to do with pain or fear.Jake tossed the wire cutters back into the trunk and reached toward Tobias, making him flinch slightly, and rested a hand against his neck.His bare neck.
Tobias looked down, Jake’s hand warm and gentle against the naked skin of his neck, and saw the collar in the dirt by his feet.Slowly, hardly believing that he wouldn’t touch blood and bone, he reached for his neck on the side opposite of where Jake’s hand rested, brushing his own fingers over the exposed skin.
He looked up, so filled with emotions he couldn’t even name—was this shock, terror, wonder?—that he stared straight into Jake’s eyes, incapable of hiding himself, of not looking and looking his fill.He couldn’t read Jake’s face, but what Jake saw in Tobias’s expression made his eyes flicker with something that Tobias couldn’t put a name to, that made him nervous without being afraid.
Then Jake enfolded Tobias in his arms, pulling him to his chest in a grip that was warm and secure but strangely not confining.Tobias felt warmth unlike anything he’d ever known spreading through his body, leaving him weak-kneed.He let his eyes close.Jake was so close that when he took a breath, Tobias felt his own chest lift.It was a sensation—like electricity buzzing through his body, but without pain—that made him understand a feeling he’d never known before.
It felt like safety.
Jake held him, anchoring them together, and Tobias could think of nothing else that there would be in heaven.
It ended.Of course it ended, and it left Tobias shaky but smiling, not afraid to open his eyes and smile.Jake smiled back.
“Come on, Toby,” he said, sliding around him and opening the passenger door of the Eldorado.“Let’s blow this joint.”
Tobias got in, clumsy in the unfamiliar space, and he couldn’t keep a grin off his face.And he didn’t care.While Jake walked around to the driver’s side, Tobias ran both hands down the leather seats savoring the smell of Jake’s car, the feel of Jake’s life beneath his hands, the knowledge that Jake had come back for him, had taken him away from hell.He had kept his promise.
No matter how long it would last, no matter what happened to him after this moment, Tobias didn’t think anyone could take that joy, that peace, away from him.
***
